Why I Chose My Degree Course (And A Rant About A Module)

Yes, I realise this has nothing to do with writing, at least in the usual sense, but it felt like something I just had to post. It was a rant that just poured from my fingertips as I wrote the start of my ‘Day Eight’ post before starting to write that scene and it carried on from there. I think it just shows the way in which what you expect to enjoy can sometimes end up being what you hate.

It’s two days before I head off to university and I’ve still got those two plays to read by next Monday’s tutorial which will be an interesting experience. It’s funny because when I started applying for university in Year 13 I was clueless as to what subject I wanted to take. History? English? Geography (if I could have only done the Tectonics stuff)? Creative Writing? English with Creative Writing?

So I narrowed it down to History/English/English with Creative Writing on the basis that the only Disasters course I could find was in Coventry and it wasn’t a place that I’d ever visited before aside from passing through once on a bus, and the entry requirements were lower.

So. English with Creative Writing didn’t inspire me enough but History didn’t enthrall me either. To put it plainly, my experience at Sixth Form had zapped my love of learning away because when you are having to take more responsibility for your learning than the teachers who are supposed to make it happen it just isn’t fun anymore. Especially not with limited resources.

I decided on History based on the fact I loved the city my university was in and the fact I had experience of the university from a scheme I was on. The city was my dream, I’m not ashamed to say. Not the course, not really.

But I’ve enjoyed it, these last few weeks, more than I thought I would. There are three modules I like, one I’m indifferent to and two I hate with a burning passion. One is a History module and it’s just a horribly boring period to me.

Module Two? The English module. I enjoyed A Level English because half of it was just Creative Writing and the other half was an Arthur Miller play that I grew to love. My revision, aside from a handful of essays, was reading a GCSE revision guide and watching the film.

Turns out that isn’t what they’re looking for at uni. The endless analysis of the plays drives me insane, especially when you are meant to show your opinions in certain ways and go so deep into the meaning of the plays that in the end well, quite frankly, I’m past the point of caring. As this Venn diagram shows:

At least I learned something helpful last term. Never again choose to take an English Literature module because it won’t be ‘fun’ or ‘enlightening’ or any of those other words I thought it would be. Perhaps other people can gain a lot from these courses and I do know they can –